


Lost in the Stars

by icespyders



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Alternate Universe, Fluff, M/M, extreme strider rambling, road trip au
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-01
Updated: 2014-05-01
Packaged: 2018-01-21 11:30:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,929
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1548977
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icespyders/pseuds/icespyders
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>John and Dave take a break from driving on their road trip to stargaze. John is a bit more focused on Dave than on the stars, though. Such is the burden of having a massive crush on your best friend with the pretty-talking mouth.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lost in the Stars

Your name is John Egbert and the stars look particularly nice tonight.

The dark sky is wide open over your head and everything’s quiet as you lie on your back on the hood of your best friend Dave’s car. Well, almost quiet. Dave’s talking, but you don’t mind. In fact, his voice relaxes you more than the silence of nature would. He’s been going on for like twenty minutes now with no sign of stopping anytime soon. Something about outer space.

“…like, I dunno, scientists or whoever the fuck say stars are actually a billion years in the past or whatever? You ever heard that?”

“Something like that,” you agree, eyes closed. Your words echo across the stillness; the two of you are pulled over on some local road far off from the highway, barely illuminated by sparse, flickering streetlights. You’re supposed to be driving non-stop cross-country, but by now you’ve gotten sidetracked too many times to count. The trip has devolved from purposeful to meandering, but, again, you don’t even mind.

“So we’re looking at the stars right now, yeah? But the light takes so long to travel that they could already be dead. We’re just staring at dead stars all like ‘wow how beautiful’ like fucking assholes. Leering at star-corpses. Should let ‘em just rest in peace, y’know?”

You laugh. “Dude, that’s so stupid.”

“Don’t mock _science_ , Egbert. I know it’s a lot to wrap your tiny brain around but you can’t just deny the facts of reality.”

“They can’t all be dead, Dave,” you reply, turning your head so he can see you roll your eyes. “There’s a ton of stars, some of them have to still be alive. Duh.”

He scowls at you, red eyes narrowed. His oversized aviators are resting on top of his head, sending strands of his hair sticking up wildly and displaying the scattered freckles across his nose and cheeks. It’s really not fair how attractive he can be without even trying. Especially at moments like these, when he talks without stopping and his Southern drawl starts to crop up at the ends of his words. “You don’t know shit, John.”

“You know I’m right. Just admit it,” you tease.

“Well...” He sighs and rolls his eyes back at you. “I guess you could possibly have a point. Maybe.”

“Maybe,” you repeat mockingly.

“It’s a very slim chance.” His eyes go back to the sky. “It’s still weird, though, don’t you think?”

“What?”

He spreads his arms wide. “This. Space. Stars. Everything. Isn’t it weird? We’re alive and breathing on this planet right now but stars could be exploding and we won’t even see til we’re old and the light gets here.”

“Getting existential?”

He shakes his head. “Nah, not even that. But I get it. World’s just so damn big, it’s easy to start feeling like you don’t matter. Like you’re only some random moron drifting around the universe like a kid in a candy shop. Just gawking at all the crazy shit you’re seeing. Damn, junior, better buckle up, you’re gonna lose your _mind_ at the giant lollipops. You’re not even halfway prepared for that shit. You can barely comprehend the fact that they make ten-pound chocolate bars, you thought they only came in fuckin’ fun-size.”

You’re chuckling again, but quietly, so as not to cut him off. He’s gearing up for a full-on monologue, you can tell, and you’re excited. You shift over an inch closer to him and, luckily, he doesn’t seem to notice.

“But hey. I still feel important, you know? Just ‘cause the universe is way bigger than me doesn’t make me worth any less. Like, I’ll never go into a stupid black hole or whatever. I’ll never understand all the mysteries of reality. I’ll never know if the stars are dead or not. But that’s cool.”

Your eyes fall shut again as his words wash over you and it’s more soothing than anything else you can imagine. You wish you could fall asleep to the sound of his voice every night, and it’s terrifying how badly you want it when you know it’ll never happen.

“At least I can see them now, and do all the connect-the-dots to make constellations, and see eclipses and shooting stars and the aurora borealis and all that. The moon still looks rad even though it’s all fucked up from meteors. The sun’s just this crazy enormous ball of fire in the goddamn sky but it gently caresses my face from the inky black void of outer space and puts freckles on my nose. So I’ll keep doing my thing. Dumb minor things are important to me even though they don’t have any big cosmic significance. And that’s totally fine. Right?”

When he talks like this it makes you want to kiss him because all his words make his mouth seem so beautiful. But you can’t, for a whole myriad of reasons. The most important reason is that doing so would stem the wonderful deluge of dialogue. And there’s also the fact that he’s your best friend and it’d be weird, you just know it, you’d ruin everything if you did it. He couldn’t possibly want to kiss you back. Even now in the middle of nowhere with no one to see but the stars.

“Are you listening to me?” For a minute you weren’t, but you pretend otherwise. “Mmhmm,” you mumble, trying to distract yourself from thinking about what that pretty-talking mouth would feel like on yours. “So what’s important to you?”

“Loaded question, Egbert. Lots of things. You falling asleep?”

“Uh-uh,” you deny, but your voice is even more mumbly than it was a minute ago.

“You’re not allowed to fall asleep, we gotta make it back to civilization first. It’s a ways and I’m not gonna be able to stay awake unless you’re yammering about Ghostbusters or Con Air or whatever the fuck in my ear.”

His voice sounds very far away and you sigh, opening your eyes halfway. He’s leaning over you, the strings on his hoodie dangling in your face, and he hasn’t put his shades back down yet so you’re drawn into his eyes and your brain goes slow. “I’m good,” you insist, but your voice is very quiet.

“Sure you are,” Dave says with a wry half-smile. “I dunno, you look pretty exhausted.”

“No, I’m good, I swear.”

“Can’t fall asleep on my car, dude. I won’t allow it. You might drool on the windshield and the spit will ruin this impeccable vehicle.”

You sit up indignantly and now your face is dangerously close to his. “I don’t _drool_ , Dave. And your stupid car is already shitty, I couldn’t do anything to make it worse,” you claim.

“John, you fail to realize that I wake up way before you and we’ve been sharing gross motel rooms for the past few weeks. I can promise you that you definitely drool like a tiny infant,” he tells you, his smile growing meanly.

“Shut up!” you yell, punching his arm, and the two of you break down into laughter. You feel yourself sink back against the windshield but, somehow, Dave’s even closer to you than he was before. How’d that happen? The gap between the two of you has shrunk quite a bit, you realize, feeling your face go hot. You hope you’re not actually blushing. Or if you are, you hope that at least he won’t be able to see.

“You do. You really do,” Dave goes on, and his smile just keeps growing as he teases you and he’s so close that you can practically count his freckles in the darkness. “You know how they do that hydropower shit? Like they use waterfalls for electricity? No idea how it works but you could probably do it with the sheer volume of spit you spew in your sleep.”

“You’re an asshole,” you laugh. “And you talk in your sleep, so don’t even start.”

“What? Hell no.”

“Yeah! You snore too.”

“No way. Too cool for that shit. Like, federally too cool. I have a certificate named after a dead president to prove it.”

“You wake me up!”

“How? I’m in a different fucking bed. You got ears like a goddamn bat.”

“No, you’re just really loud. I can promise you that your snoring _definitely_ sounds like heavy machinery,” you say, mimicking his inflection as you use his words back at him.

“You know, you can hitchhike the rest of the way if you like,” he retorts.

You frown at him. “But how will you stay awake without me talking at you?”

“I’ll talk to myself.”

“Yeah, and that’s not crazy.”

“Don’t go calling names. It’s hella rude and you might hurt my feelings. I’m very delicate, John.”

His arm has shifted so his hand is now on the hood of the car beside your ribcage and your heart’s caught in your throat, he’s too close for you to think straight. You hardly know what you’re doing but you run your fingers across his. All your mind can process is how warm his hand is.

“You didn’t answer my question,” you remind him softly.

“Hmm?”

“What’s important to you? If you’re not spending every day concerned about dead stars, that is,” you say.

“I answered it. I said a lot of things,” he replies.

You shake your head and let your fingertips rest on his hand lightly, waiting for him to move away, but he doesn’t. You’re too sleepy to be nervous about overstepping boundaries, all you know is you want him closer. “Not good enough. Too vague.”

“Bullshit it’s too vague.”

“Come on! Can’t you think of anything specific?”

“There’s too much. I can’t name just one.”

“What about me?” The words slip past your lips before you can even think about it, they jolt you awake and the bottom abruptly drops out of your stomach. You wish you could undo the last ten seconds but you can’t; the words are there, they’re hovering in the tiny distance between the two of you, and you can hardly even breathe. His expression is unreadable, mouth hanging half-open, but you can’t help but notice that he hasn’t pulled back.

Finally he speaks: “Of course you are.” His words flood you with warmth because they’re among the most beautiful ones you’ve ever heard him say, and you’ve heard him say a lot. Your other hand finds its way to his face, fingers ghosting over his cheek hesitantly.

He edges closer and you go cross-eyed looking at him. In a rush, you stretch up and push your mouth against his, unable to hold back for a second longer. His lips are softer than you expected, and, even more surprisingly, he kisses you hard, shoving you backwards against the windshield. You feel him move so he’s straddling your hips and his weight is resting on you, his free hand goes to your hair as you clasp your arms behind his neck. You hear him breathing in the emptiness and it’s as if there’s nothing in the world besides the two of you and the millions of stars above your heads. It’s all more perfect than you ever could have imagined.

Finally he pulls back and rests his forehead on yours, and you stroke his cheek gently. He’s smiling like you’ve never seen before, in such a sweetly genuine way that makes your heart flutter in your chest.

“Well, damn, John. What was that for?” he murmurs.

You shrug and smile back at him. “I like the way you talk.”


End file.
